Saturday, September 29, 2007

This chart makes me laugh & laugh. Someone took the time to make a colour-coded chart to track the progress of the models on ANTM, Cycle 9, and plans to promptly update post-episodes. I think I'll track the chart's progress.

Thursday, September 27, 2007

i leave my computer overnight at work lotsa days. that means no bloggery. so, sorry about that. i guess.

today's dinosaur comic is particularly hilarious. maybe cause of the pointing? i am not sure. (if you click on it, you'll be able to read the whole thing. or maybe it's just my screen that is cutting off part of the funny.)

soon i am going to my friend's house for supper + the office.

tomorrow is Claire's birthday. she will be elderly. she will soon require people to help her cross the road.

I read Clay by David Almond since the library was kind enough to lend it to me. It's not like Skellig (except for the boy protagonist whose life changes when he encounters a strange magical stranger); it's more grown-up and monstrous. But bliddy good. Now reading Winkie, and Jen was right.

And finally, I have been in a serious grump all week long (maybe two weeks?). Misery coating on everything. But please don't ask why cause there is nothing that i can properly articulate and i don't wanna lie to you.

Shake it off, shake it off: The Office. Nuit Blanche. Bluegrass Brunch with people I haven't seen in 10 years. Edmonton? And best of all, new baby new baby new baby.

Sunday, September 23, 2007

I've invented some pretty decent aliases over the years; Georgia Tot Sint Jans comes to mind, as does the #1 champion last name of Calhoun. And I have a new one (inspired in part by the Grocery Gateway delivery person): Tabitha Soxfield. I'm not sure yet what I'm going to do with that name, but something. It's just marvy. And a google search came up empty-handed (did I mean Tabitha Foxfield? nope.) so it's mine all mine.

News: Had my first ballet class with Sarah D. We both did very well (she is better at the ballet technique, and so on) and I am sooooo glad we are going. My life has already improved by a million. (That is a serious exaggeration.)Books: Just finished Skellig by David Almond...I've read several books for young'uns lately, and I think this one takes the cake. It's such a straightforward book about the most extraordinary things; you just march along between the sadly realistic and the realistically fantastical. Claire tells me a film adaptation is in the works and I can see how it would translate quite well. I'll be reading David Almond's Clay next. (The TPL has given me a stack of books all at once and I wonder if I'll manage to get thru 'em.)

Today: A pumpkin patch with Erino and S'rain since it's autumn, officially.

TV TK:The Office starts up again this week and you can bet I am happy about that. Bet on it. It's a safe bet. Tho I am reluctant (and have already missed ep. #1), I think I shall try ANTM again this cycle. It will be awful and exactly as it has been for eight cycles but but but so hard to look away. Have I expressed my undying love for Weeds? I am rewatching S.1 with R. and just saw the episode that ends with Selia (sp?) saying, "I took a lude." Oh it knocks my socks off.

Saturday, September 22, 2007

This poor horsey is trapped in a furniture store at King & Parliament. Some mean-spirited prankster put a lampshade on an otherwise regal creature's head. Why? Also: spooky. More Horse Lamp pictures here on my flickr page

Saturday, September 15, 2007

what happened to all the pink? CHANGE happened, people. We'll see if this template's a winner or not but I was tired of looking at all those hues of rose. So now we are cleaned up. White-washed. But without the negative connotations.

Which reminds me (the template change does), at ECW we've launched our new website. It's way better than before (but perhaps a few bugs linger? yes of course. let me know if you find one+). Have a look see.

Today I will make a lasagna. Today I will read a very tres bon manuscript that will, in fall 2008, be a very tres bon book. Today I will get rid of some cobwebs. Today I will think about my superpal who is ready to give birth to a baby boy predestined to have excellent taste in TV and books. Today I will be studying for the upcoming Tori Amos concert. Today I will be so much better than before.

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

my holiday is over. ***oh brit-brit. too much too soon, my darlin.but it's the media/bloggers reactions to her that makes me saddest of all. it's all so nauseatingly shallow and mean. total idiocy.***i may be getting a cold.***reading Strangers on a Train and going loony as a result. part of my new(ish) plan: I Read Your Favourite Authors. there are far far too many choices out there so y'all can be my guides. And the good thing is for someone who reads a lot, there's a lot i haven't read. so chances are your recommendation will be novel to me. so send 'em in.

Sharelle blogged about this a while back but I've taken to using it so shall mention it here. Musicovery — for when you are tired of your own music or can't think of what the fuck to listen to. It provides ya with songs by people you forgot you liked and songs by people you really should like.

Musicovery is a pretty little webradio application that allows users to select the music they would like to listen to based on various parameters. Click a point in the “matrix” of the calm/energetic and dark/positive axes to determine the mood of the music you want to listen to. Also select by genre, decade and popularity. A click in the neighborhood of “calm” and “positive” within the “electro” genre spawned a pretty little organic blossom of…wait for it…calm and positive electronic music

While I'm pilfering Sharelle's blog, let's mention the Thomas Allen pulp fiction cover stand-ups. I think they are marvy and may have to get myself his book, which Sharelle tells usis calledUncovered. More at Foley Gallery.

In our town of Flinton, Clairey, S'rain, and I went to a flea market, which was more like a trunk sale with some perma stands. A lot of mason jars on sale, but also a dried-grass parking lot full of cassette tapes and books. Two copies of Paula Abdul's remix album Shut Up and Dance (i already have it so didn't get it), a million Heart tapes, Chris Sheppard, George Michael.... S'rain went for the Corey Hart and early Michael Jackson. Claire found a Fred Astaire CD. I added to my Dylan Thomas collection and now own two recordings of Under Milk Wood, this one a BBC production with Richard Burton. I listened to the first half last night and it's quite magical and funny. Funnier than I remember. As far as I can tell, it's the 1954 recording but you can hear the 1963 one here. Also for 25 cents apeach, The Ice Age (Margaret Drabble) and Lolita (Vladimir Nabokov). Plus three not-so-torrid romance novels for cabin reading. Flipping through one, Dearest Traitor, for the naughty bits, I came across the best-ever whispered sweet nothing. Our heroine Georgina is being overpowered by the ferocious Stephen. He reaches up under her sweater and says something like, "Your breasts are soft and supple, warm like a kitten." I urge my boob-caressing readers to try this out on a lady friend in the near future. PLEASE. If you can keep a straight face.

And I've finished Hairy Potts Numero 7 so feel free to discuss the ending with me whenever you please. I felt compelled to read it as fast as possible but must admit that I don't really care for any of the characters and was accordingly not that invested. Also I had le grand pleasure of telling Claire what I would have included in the last book if I were J.K. and was right on track with most of it. Minus the crap epilogue (crapilogue). And the bit about a character called Crissy Calhoun riding in on her horse Thunderbuckeroo (borrowed from S'rain) to save the day by leading Dumbledore's Army and the Death Eaters in a spontaneous yet perfectly synchronized dance routine that unites them all. And you best believe we'd have a laser light show with all those wands, jazzing it up. Quite the show.

Now reading Daniel Handler's Watch Your Mouth. The cover is AWFUL but the text is molto bene thus far. I guess that's one more point for not judging a book by its cover.

Saturday, September 01, 2007

Sadly we didn't run into each other, Commander.I wandered around with my nerdly bro-in-law Richie for hours on end and took some stellar photos with my cruddy camera. The Guitar Hero competition was a surprise delight -- there is something so endearing about watching a 13 year old rock out on a plastic guitar, entirely shy but performing nevertheless. I went to (count 'em) TWO Q&A's -- Adam West and our darling Charisma Carpenter. Both of whom are charming and funny. It turns out Charisma and I are indeed two separate people tho I don't have the photo evidence to prove it. (Unless a photo I took with her a tiny spec in the bg proves it. No, I didn't think so.)

My favourite thing is the people all dressed up and in particular the families of cos-players. I think I'll be going back today but am scared I will spend all my moolah on geeky merchandise like buffy and angel playing cards, BSG t-shirts, Dr. Who piggy banks, a lifesize metal Terminator statue, ....

Superfantastic.

The Calhouninator.

*********************

Dear Da,

I hope that your football match is brilliant and exciting and that your team wins and also practices wells beforehand.

Never have I read Joyce Oates. Everyday it seems someone mentions a book or a writer that I have not read. I should keep a master list with me of the book recommended, and by whom, and try to get my way through it eventually. It seems infinite.

I am reading the last Harry Potter book in an effort to finish it before I am spoiled by spoilers. So far so good. It's more exciting than the last one and really that's all they offer a reader of my age. My old old age. Then I have two library books to read: another children's book but by Clive Barker and then an adult book by a writer best known for his children's books (Lemony Snicket). And I've just finished reading A Wrinkle in Time — that's one I couldn't believe I'd made it this far without encountering.I agree about the preening and pruning people with their Warhol haircuts. Shudder. Some of them are likely to leave Londontown and descend on our town for the film festival. Those uniformed folks with badges and cellphones and, it used to be, black turtlenecks.Alas poor Yorick. I had a dream last night that I could see you on the street out my window and you were doing a crazy dance, like that Italian clowning you like (but I find frightening). I think it was because Claire, Adam, and I looked at photos last night — among them you dancing on the street in New Orleans with the hobo, first thing in the morning, painter's cap on.

Today we're going up to the cabin. S'rain has lots of work to do she has mentioned and Claire and I have lots of reading work to do. Mine more fun than Claire's. She is studying for her mba and I am reading (experimental) fiction written by Daccia, daughter to George, who you've likely met once or twice. And next week I'm off from work. Shall wander about town with Claire and perhaps get some dullish practical things done too. Leaky faucet and all that.